Alum Creates First Public Virtual High School in N.H.

Steve Kossakoski, who earned a master’s degree in education and doctorate in education administration at UNH, founded New Hampshire’s only public online high school, the Virtual Learning Academy Charter School.

Education department alum Steve Kossakoski is giving public high school students an alternative to the in-person public high school model through New Hampshire’s first virtual public high school, the Virtual Learning Academy Charter School.

A nonprofit, VLACS is publicly funded like traditional public K-12 schools and is administratively located in Exeter. Any New Hampshire resident under 21 can attend VLACS for free. Most of VLACS students are part-time students who attend a New Hampshire public school. The rest of the students are home-schooled students, private-school students, or students who dropped out of high school.

VLACS enrollment has skyrocketed from 350 students at its inception in 2007 to more than 10,000 today. It is the eighth largest virtual high school in the nation.

Students read traditional high school textbooks and spend a considerable amount of time outside of class working on projects to meet course competencies and having experiences that tie directly to their in-class learning. For example, for a government class, students might volunteer with a political campaign or work in a town office.